As a computing environment oriented toward desktop personal computers (PCs) transitions to a computing environment oriented toward mobile devices such as laptops, smart phones, etc., there is a tendency for a thin client computing environment to be provided to a plurality of users.
A thin client literally refers to a light-weighted simple terminal. It is expected that thin clients will replace large heavy-weighted desktop PCs that have occupied large spaces so far. Thin clients are not limited to specific shapes, but may be provided in various forms.
Thin client computing does not only change the appearances of PCs, but also fundamentally changes the method of computing. Thin client computing may be also called “server-based computing.” The term “server-based” means that all appliances are disposed on a server, as in the case where money is deposited in a bank. Accordingly, thin client computing does not require that the capacity of the memory or storage of a client should be high. It is sufficient if a client connects to a server whenever it requires a program, in which case it is sufficient if software is executed on the server, rather than being downloaded and used, and then the results of the execution are received and displayed on a screen. In particular, in the case of mobile terminals that are sensitive to power consumption due to the limited capacity of batteries, the use of effective computing is enabled using a small quantity of resources by minimizing a computation function.
Meanwhile, Korean Patent No. 10-0490401 entitled “Image Processing Apparatus and Method in Thin-Client (TC) Environment” discloses an image processing apparatus, including a communication network, a client system, and a server configured to execute a predetermined application in response to a request from the client system and to transmit results to the client system over the communication network, wherein the server includes an image processing means configured to process the rendering of a graphic signal to be processed through acceleration in response to a request from the client system and to encode the graphic signal processed through acceleration and a video signal associated with the graphic signal.
Although the preceding technology has the advantage of minimizing the load of the TC server through the processing of a graphic part, processed in the TC server in a software manner, in a hardware manner, server-based computing may not be smoothly performed because the burden of the server or the data transmission burden of the network is high in the case where the number of local clients that a single remote server takes charge of is large or the size of data that the server and the client needs to transmit in a TC environment is large.